This invention relates generally to golf bags and more specifically to a golf bag in which the clubs are arranged for ease of selection and to prevent interference between adjacent clubs. Most prior art golf bags are of a simple design in which a number of golf clubs comprising a set are randomly positioned with the shaft end of each club resting on the bottom of the bag. These bags are disadvantageous in that the heads of the clubs are free to rotate into contact with each other, oftentimes resulting in damage to the heads. In addition, the shafts of the clubs are prone to entanglement that causes difficulties in removing or inserting a particular club, to say nothing of the marring caused to the shafts of expensive clubs that have graphite shafts. Moreover, in this type of bag, the clubs are at best randomly positioned in the bag, with the position of the clubs constantly changing as the bag is transported or as individual clubs are removed or inserted.
Various attempts at solving the problems described above have been made in the prior art. For example, head covers made of soft cloth or fur materials are available to prevent damage to the heads of clubs. However, these covers are a nuisance to remove from a club selected for play or to replace on a club being returned to the bag. In some known types of golf bags, vertical compartments have been fashioned in an attempt to prevent tangling of the club shafts. However, each of these compartments typically retains three or more clubs, which are free to move around in their compartment and cause damage to each other. Removable plastic tubes are available in the prior art for insertion into a golf bag for the purpose of individually receiving the club shafts and keeping them separated from each other. In another known type of golf bag, fixed plastic tubes are provided for receiving the club shafts in a separated position.
None of the above-described prior art golf bags prevent free rotation of the heads of the clubs that are retained therein, a condition that interferes with their accessibility to the user and, as previously stated, is likely to result in damage to the heads. A so-called Eagle's Nest bag attempts to address this problem by providing a vertically sloping rack at the top of the bag, in which the heads of iron clubs are individually retained in fixed positions. However, this prior art bag makes no provision for wood clubs and provides no protection for the shafts of individual clubs to prevent contact that results in marring the shafts and entanglement thereof.
It is therefore the principal object of the present invention to provide an improved golf bag in which the shafts of a set of golf clubs are individually retained to prevent interference between them, in which the heads of iron clubs are retained in predetermined fixed positions of ready accessibility to the user, and in which the heads of wood clubs are arranged at different heights above the heads of the iron clubs to make them readily identifiable and accessible and to prevent interference with the heads of other wood or iron clubs.
This and other incidental objects are accomplished in accordance with the illustrated preferred embodiment of the present invention by providing a generally cylindrical bag having a plurality of vertical tubes fixedly arranged therein, the number of which corresponds to the number of clubs comprising the set of clubs to be retained in the bag. The tubes are retained within the bag in parallel relationship to each other by means of a circular tube header positioned at the top of the bag and a tube separation plate positioned intermediate the length of the tubes. The tube header retains the top ends of a plurality of the tubes at one height and the top ends of a remaining plurality of the tubes at another height. The tubes and header are arranged such that a number of the tubes are centered on a circle within the outer periphery of the tube header, with the remaining tubes positioned inside that circle. Each of the tubes designated for receiving a particular iron club includes an outward facing notch therein that extends downward into an an adjacent portion of the tube header to retain the heads of the respective iron clubs in an outwardly directed, fixed position Each of the notches is shaped in correspondence with the shape of the head of the specific iron club which it is intended to receive. Four of the tubes, centered on a diametric line across the tube header at the highest level thereof, are designated to receive the four wood clubs of a set. Each of these four tubes has a plug near the bottom of the tube to receive the shaft end of a club such that when the wood clubs are inserted into these tubes their heads are at different heights above the heights of the iron clubs to thereby prevent interference with each other as well as interference with the heads of the iron clubs.